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Post by Ginnie on Dec 12, 2007 0:25:13 GMT -4
Ps. Anyone with any evidence of good music and or movies give me a pointer please.
Brian Eno - Hear Come the Warm Jets (1973) Sensational Alex Harvey Band - The Impossible Dream (1973) Roxy Music - Stranded (1973) The Stooges - Raw Power (1973) The New York Dolls - The New York Dolls (1973)
movies: Papillion (1973) Badlands (1973) The Last Detail (1973) Mean Streets (1973)
I guess it was a good year...
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Post by 3onthetree on Dec 12, 2007 3:32:48 GMT -4
The US dollar is a fiat currency, it's value is determined by is scarcity and the amount of faith people have in it. Oil is a commodity as it is required in the manufacture of little fiat dollar bills, there is no faith component in the value of oil you either have it or some other bugger does and wants something in exchange for it. Even horses, however you can't just show up on the docks of Kuwait with a shiPload of horses. You need a horsebroker to convert your thoroughbreds into little fiat dollars with which you then may purchase your oil. You see why these Iranian nu-cu-lur terrorists are such a pain, hell their banks aren't even allowed to charge interest on loans. Now if you're lucky enough to be an American you may bypass the the whole horse trading drama and just print some paper for your oil, how much printing you need to do in the future looks like being determined by the people with oil and horses. I know it's more complex than this and I was being metaphorical as usual but this is the crux of the matter. It used to be fine when uncle Sam was cruising around in his free navy protecting the provinces from the red menace, real or imagined. What I see now is a good part of the world being fed up with the octopus that the US has become. You can add to that the traitorous big bankers and power brokers in the US itself who care nothing for the average Joe and would dearly love to capitalize on an engineered US economic collapse.
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Post by echnaton on Dec 12, 2007 11:26:10 GMT -4
big bankers ...who...would dearly love to capitalize on an engineered US economic collapse.
Are these the same big bankers at CitiGroup that lost $17 billion in equity by owning levered up sub prime mortgages. What about those brilliant guys at Merrill or UBS and their billions of losses. Banks do not benefit from economic collapse.
Edited to add;
However if you are a sharp hedge fund manager that recognizes when people are making foolish investments, like levered up poorly secured mortgages, you can reap some big bucks.
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Jason
Pluto
May all your hits be crits
Posts: 5,579
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Post by Jason on Dec 12, 2007 11:58:54 GMT -4
How many currencies in the world do not derive their value from the amount of faith people have in it? I'll give you a hint: paper or electronic currency has no real value in and of itself.
As someone who works at a bank I can confirm that the sub-prime mortgage crises has not been good for business. Our stock has dropped about thirty points since August. Nobody here has been happy about that.
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Al Johnston
"Cheer up!" they said, "It could be worse!" So I did, and it was.
Posts: 1,453
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Post by Al Johnston on Dec 12, 2007 12:24:10 GMT -4
There's nothing about the intrinsic properties of gold that make it valuable either, only peoples' perceptions.
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Post by 3onthetree on Dec 12, 2007 23:41:10 GMT -4
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Post by 3onthetree on Dec 13, 2007 0:12:19 GMT -4
There's nothing about the intrinsic properties of gold that make it valuable either, only peoples' perceptions. Gold is shiny, other people think it's shiny too.
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Jason
Pluto
May all your hits be crits
Posts: 5,579
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Post by Jason on Dec 13, 2007 11:42:39 GMT -4
Brass is shiny, and other people think it's shiny too.
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Post by PhantomWolf on Dec 13, 2007 15:37:59 GMT -4
So is aluminim and a lot of other metals.
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Post by 3onthetree on Dec 13, 2007 22:33:03 GMT -4
Brass is shiny, and other people think it's shiny too. Brass is an alloy made from Copper and Zinc, you won't find Mr T wearing brass bling. There's nothing shiny about Bauxite and even after the Bayer process you have to blast the hell out of it with Electricity. If you tried to peg the Dollar to Aluminium Al gore would punch you right in the Kyoto as evil C02 is an iceberg busting byproduct.
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Post by PhantomWolf on Dec 13, 2007 23:25:32 GMT -4
The only interesting things about gold is that it is rather hard to oxidise, so it's generally found in it's metal form and that it is yellow in colour. In itself it has no value other than what people are willing to pay for it.
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Jason
Pluto
May all your hits be crits
Posts: 5,579
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Post by Jason on Dec 14, 2007 0:35:45 GMT -4
Mr. T likes wearing gold bling because of the cultural significance - the faith people have in it, if you will - not just because it's shiny.
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Post by gillianren on Dec 14, 2007 0:48:19 GMT -4
Heck, I own some bronze jewelry. It, too, is shiny. "Shiny" does not equal "valuable."
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Post by Grand Lunar on Dec 15, 2007 9:09:57 GMT -4
The only interesting things about gold is that it is rather hard to oxidise, so it's generally found in it's metal form and that it is yellow in colour. In itself it has no value other than what people are willing to pay for it. That's what came to my mind too. I recall a video describing galvanic corrosion in relation to outboard engines, and mentioning that gold is not very active. It quickly added that it wouldn't be practical to make a lower gear unit out of gold, and then went on to describe the use of sacrafial anodes.
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lenbrazil
Saturn
Now there's a man with an open mind - you can feel the breeze from here!
Posts: 1,045
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Post by lenbrazil on Dec 15, 2007 18:18:29 GMT -4
Ps. Anyone with any evidence of good music and or movies give me a pointer please.Brian Eno - Hear Come the Warm Jets (1973) Sensational Alex Harvey Band - The Impossible Dream (1973) Roxy Music - Stranded (1973) The Stooges - Raw Power (1973) The New York Dolls - The New York Dolls (1973) movies:Papillion (1973) Badlands (1973) The Last Detail (1973) Mean Streets (1973) I guess it was a good year... It looks like we have similar taste in music and movies additions I’d make are (more or less in my order of preference): Albums: Billion Dollar Babies and Holy Muscle of Love by Alice Cooper Goat’s Head Soup by the Stones Berlin by Lou Reed Headhunters by Herbie Hancock Greeting by Asbury Park. N.J. by Bruce Springsteen Aerosmith Movies: Sleeper The Adventures of Rabbi Jacob (French) Serpico The Sting The Exorcist American Graffiti Cleopatra Jones
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